File photo: A protected sea turtle nest on a Florida beach Photo: Sea ShepherdSea Shepherd Conservation Society is offering a $2,000 reward for information leading to the arrest and conviction of a man and a woman who intentionally ran over sea turtle nests and nesting seabird chicks on the beach at Anna Maria Island, Florida.

Ana Maria Island is located on Florida’s northwestern Gulf Coast near Bradenton, just south of St. Petersburg.

The incident began at 10:30 pm on Saturday, June 27 between Holmes Beach and Bradenton Beach where the birds were hit, and ended between 30th and 27th streets in Holmes Beach.

The man and woman responsible killed two black skimmer chicks and damaged five endangered loggerhead sea turtle nests by reportedly driving a high-powered vehicle recklessly on the beach, ignoring the stakes marking the turtle nests.

File photo: A protected sea turtle nest on a Florida beach Photo: Sea ShepherdSea Shepherd is asking the public to please contact Holmes Beach Police Department at 941-708-5804 with any information regarding this incident.

“We need to stop people terrorizing diminishing populations of threatened and endangered wildlife. These people are criminals and should be dealt with as criminals to send a strong message that maiming and killing wildlife is a serious crime,” said Sea Shepherd founder and senior strategic advisor for Sea Shepherd USA, Captain Paul Watson.

Sea Shepherd’s 2015 Sea Turtle Defense Campaign Operation Jairo, currently underway in Costa Rica and Honduras, will launch in southeastern Florida in mid-July. Sea Shepherd volunteers from six nations will come together to work with Sea Turtle Oversight Protection (S.T.O.P) in Florida to guide turtle hatchlings safely to the sea, as well as to ensure that ordinances regulating commercial lighting along the beaches – which can disorient nesting turtles and hatchlings and cause them to head away from the sea and toward dangerous roadways – are adhered to and enforced.